However, what I don't understand is why they can't just force-bundle their affiliate with the parent company's cable programming like they do now with little-watched cable channels, in which case, it's a non-issue entirely.

They already do this in cities that the local affiliate is network owned and operated. That's why CBS was pulled from TWC/BHN, but not all cities, when there was the dispute between TWC and CBS.

The retrans agreement is between the station owners and the MVPDs, not between the network and the MVPDs.

Quote:

We know there are thousands of separate antennas. Are you arguing that somehow those antennas only work if they are in a specific formation, and that a single antenna alone wouldn't work?

I've heard this argument several times. Supposedly it's not possible to pick up a signal with that small of an antenna, that many working together is "technically" "one" antenna. I'm not an RF engineer so who knows.

The most interesting thing to me was there was a brief by "small and independent broadcasters" (including WKRP) in support of Aereo.

It opens:
"Contrary to Petitioners’ assertions, not all broadcasters oppose Aereo’s platform for enabling individual audience members to use an antenna to initiate their own recording and reception of over-the-air programming for personal viewing. In fact, many small and independent broadcasters (SIBs) depend heavily on such user-friendly viewing technologies to reach their audiences, esp. audiences that cannot afford home viewing equipment, cable, or satellite television, audiences who only watch broadcast content via mobile networks or the Internet, or audiences who may not be technologically sophisticated enough to set up their own antenna, digital receiver, or DVR, and configure their own mobile devices."

This to me represents those who should be on the public air waves, those who want their stuff watched without asking for additional payment and restrictions.

The more I think about it, this does not have effect for in-home Tivo's but, Tivo wants to be a cloud DVR provider next and the Cablevision DVR ruling could easily relate to that.

Except it isn't! and I can't understand why people keep thinking it is.
The Tivo model is all based around what you do with the signal AFTER it has come in to your home in a legal manner, either OTA or cable. The Aereo model never has you getting the signal. when you tie in the fact that the hundreds of little antennas are a total kludge JUST to get around the existing laws, yeah, I vote they're breaking it.

It's very easy IMO to see where Aereo is skirting laws by design to make a profit.

I am very doubtful they are profitable. I don't believe it was ever their intention to make a profit. Barry Diller is throwing money at this because he wants to see some change in the TV industry. Some kind of change will come out of this.

__________________
A passing grade? Like a C? Why don't I just get pregnant at a bus station!

...We know there are thousands of separate antennas. Are you arguing that somehow those antennas only work if they are in a specific formation, and that a single antenna alone wouldn't work?

I think that is exactly what he is saying. As someone who has tried to receive OTA broadcasts in Long Island City, I can tell you that you need a highly directional antenna to reject the reflections from buildings in Manhattan and the RFK and Queensboro bridges. I suspect that there are, indeed, some big antennas in use and those thumbnail units are, at best, just picking up a repeated signal.

I think that is exactly what he is saying. As someone who has tried to receive OTA broadcasts in Long Island City, I can tell you that you need a highly directional antenna to reject the reflections from buildings in Manhattan and the RFK and Queensboro bridges. I suspect that there are, indeed, some big antennas in use and those thumbnail units are, at best, just picking up a repeated signal.

Well from their video it is clear their receiving antennas have good line of sight with little chance of powerful reflections. Antenna placement is a location, location, location kind of thing. Also TV signals are quite strong when you are withing 5 to 10 miles of the towers.

On one hand I can imagine that those little things are not the entire antenna structure. They may be soldered to longer circuit board traces that act as collector elements. If that is the case, then those little pieces may be more like individual RF pick-offs from those elements than actual full-on antennas. On the other hand, cell phones do just fine with tiny internal antennas. And cell phone signal power is tiny in comparison to what comes off a TV transmitter. So there is plenty of precedent for them actually being individual antennas. With good line of sight and a close distance to the source, power is more than sufficient to allow for a small collection area to work.

One thing is certain, there is no need for a repeater, and it is clear that there isn't one there between the antenna boxes and the windows.

It was explained to me by an RF guy on another forum that those little elements, by themselves, are physically too small to pick up the frequencies they are supposedly picking up. And he also didn't have any idea how the "electronically tuned to only pick up one specific channel" thing worked.

I take Aereo at their word that each antenna is "independent" but I wonder if one of those little things, by itself, would actually work the way they work when they're in a large array like that.

It was explained to me by an RF guy on another forum that those little elements, by themselves, are physically too small to pick up the frequencies they are supposedly picking up. And he also didn't have any idea how the "electronically tuned to only pick up one specific channel" thing worked.

I take Aereo at their word that each antenna is "independent" but I wonder if one of those little things, by itself, would actually work the way they work when they're in a large array like that.

The tiny antennas are a matter of curiosity since it usually takes a much larger one. However even a paper clip is picking up a tiny response from every signal in the air. If the signal-to-noise is adequate an amplifier can make the signal large enough to detect. I don't see any puzzle about electronic tuning. The tuner circuits in most TV's, radios and in TiVo's are electronically tuned. Still the actual engineering to make these small elements work would be interesting to see.

Antenna arrays, in which a collection of smaller elements act as one large antenna, require the elements to either (1) have mutual electronic inter-connections or (2) have all the individual responses input to a signal processor that phase-shifts and combines them. I doubt this is what Aereo is doing -- at least they are implying otherwise IMO.

I think the RF guy was thinking of tuned antennas where the length needs to be some fraction (e.g., 1/4 th) of the wavelength for maximum coupling to a rather narrow frequency band -- commonly used in HAM radio for example. But this concept doesn't apply well to the TV band where frequencies span a wide band from 54 MHz to 890 MHz, or wavelengths from 5.55 m to 0.34 m.

__________________
"It must be swell to be so perfect and odor-free" -- Del Griffith

VideoReDo users: Try To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

pyTivo users: Try To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts. and To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

.....The Aereo model never has you getting the signal. when you tie in the fact that the hundreds of little antennas are a total kludge JUST to get around the existing laws, yeah, I vote they're breaking it. It's very easy IMO to see where Aereo is skirting laws by design to make a profit.

They're not doing it "JUST" to get around the law, they're doing it to "COMPLY" with the law, which makes it 100% legal in my humble opinion. NAB is just pissed they didn't think of it so they could rake in the profits from said idea.

FYI the oral arguments in SCOTUS wil be on one of the C-SPAN channels tonight (Friday) at 8 pm EDT.

__________________
"It must be swell to be so perfect and odor-free" -- Del Griffith

VideoReDo users: Try To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

pyTivo users: Try To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts. and To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

They're not doing it "JUST" to get around the law, they're doing it to "COMPLY" with the law, which makes it 100% legal in my humble opinion. NAB is just pissed they didn't think of it so they could rake in the profits from said idea.

I agree -- Aereo didn't make the law. It's a dumb law that is just designed as a favor to NAB members -- a typical example of how special interests manipulate the government.

__________________
"It must be swell to be so perfect and odor-free" -- Del Griffith

VideoReDo users: Try To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

pyTivo users: Try To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts. and To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

It was explained to me by an RF guy on another forum that those little elements, by themselves, are physically too small to pick up the frequencies they are supposedly picking up. And he also didn't have any idea how the "electronically tuned to only pick up one specific channel" thing worked. I take Aereo at their word that each antenna is "independent" but I wonder if one of those little things, by itself, would actually work the way they work when they're in a large array like that.

The size of an antenna can be "tuned" electronically using inductance (coils) and capacitance to make them look like any size that's a multiple of the original, as mentioned about 1/4, 1/2 wavelengths, etc. (for optimum performance). We used to do just that using HF probe antennas on the ends of the wings of the SAC Looking Glass aircraft, making it seem like the approx 4' long probe antenna was as much as an 800+ foot long trailing wire antenna. We also did the same type of thing with both horizontal and vertical trailing wire antennas used for broadcasting HF and MF (AM) transmissions from the Commando Solo airborne TV and radio broadcast aircraft. Those put out about 56 KW ERP (effective radiated power) with 10KW amplifiers, so all Aereo is doing is the reverse concept of receiving milliwatt TV signals, so I'm certainly sure based on what I know at least, that those tiny antennas "should" be able to be tuned electronically using the same design with caps and coils.

The key is knowing the freqs, which Aereo would in each given area, and then tuning them in for the best possible S/N ratio and bandwidth rejection characteristics. This is similar to what I mentioned above, but in reverse, re: broadcasting while I was in the USAF and we tuned transmission antennas based on VSWR (voltage standing wave ratio, i.e - signal reflection) back into the amps.

More than one poster has pointed out that the Aereo approach is not "scalable". I'm not so sure of that. Lets say the cost of setting up a tiny antenna and tuning circuit is $500 and make the worst case assumption that there actually has to be one antenna per subscirber. Say the cost of maintaining the equipment and the cloud support costs $4/mo. per sub. That leaves $4/mo to amortize the antenna/tuner cost, or $48/year. That is almost a 10% return on the $500 investment, which is quite attractive.

My numbers are pulled out of the air but even if they are way off, the potential for profitable scalability seems to be there.

__________________
"It must be swell to be so perfect and odor-free" -- Del Griffith

VideoReDo users: Try To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

pyTivo users: Try To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts. and To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

The size of an antenna can be "tuned" electronically using inductance (coils) and capacitance to make them look like any size that's a multiple of the original, as mentioned about 1/4, 1/2 wavelengths, etc. (for optimum performance). We used to do just that using HF probe antennas on the ends of the wings of the SAC Looking Glass aircraft, making it seem like the approx 4' long probe antenna was as much as an 800+ foot long trailing wire antenna. We also did the same type of thing with both horizontal and vertical trailing wire antennas used for broadcasting HF and MF (AM) transmissions from the Commando Solo airborne TV and radio broadcast aircraft. Those put out about 56 KW ERP (effective radiated power) with 10KW amplifiers, so all Aereo is doing is the reverse concept of receiving milliwatt TV signals, so I'm certainly sure based on what I know at least, that those tiny antennas "should" be able to be tuned electronically using the same design with caps and coils.

The key is knowing the freqs, which Aereo would in each given area, and then tuning them in for the best possible S/N ratio and bandwidth rejection characteristics. This is similar to what I mentioned above, but in reverse, re: broadcasting while I was in the USAF and we tuned transmission antennas based on VSWR (voltage standing wave ratio, i.e - signal reflection) back into the amps.

Yeah, you are probably right, like I said I'm not an RF or antenna guy, just things I've heard chatter about. I'm inclined to believe Aereo because while there are a lot of shady people in the world, I don't think they'd have been able to raise the money they've raised if it was a scam.

Hmm... Let's see --- what entities will come after me with a gun (i.e., use violence) to enforce a mob's will? Well there is the mafia (criminals to be more general) and there's the government. Capitalists are not on that list.

Hahahaha what? This is maybe the most nonsensical thing I've ever heard.

Do you think the Mob is anti-capitalism? If you don't think capitalists will come to your door with guns, what about with chemicals they dumped into your water supply, like in Charleston WV? Or soot illegally vented to the air, like at KU energy in KY? Or what about with illegal anti-competitive hiring practices, like at Google/Apple/etc? Or maybe they will just mess up your life with rent seeking behaviors, like banning direct sales of Tesla motor's cars?

Your gibberish about capitalists being innocuous shows an incredibly naivety on many fronts. Capitalism is by definition a self-serving enterprise, and frequently results in zero-sum wealth distribution outcomes.

"Aereo is retransmitting the content thousands of times to thousands of different people."

But they are doing so one antenna and one customer at a time, and that makes all the difference in the world.

If you and I live side by side in a city served by Aereo, the cable company can pull in the local CBS affiliate on a single antenna and send that to splitters and distribution amps and send it both our houses (and a whole lot of others), and that's considered "re-transmission".

If each of us puts up an antenna to bring that CBS affiliate's signal into our respective houses, that's not considered re-transmission, it's just reception.

If we both subscribe to Aereo, Aereo has to dedicate an antenna to each of us, so that's two antennas where the cable company only uses one.

You don't see the signal that comes in via my Aereo antenna, and vice versa, any more than either of us sees the signal from the other's house mounted antenna.

So what we get from Aereo is not, legally, a re-transmission, so re-transmission fees don't have to be paid to that local broadcaster.

The reason the networks are involved is that Aereo is currently mostly if not exclusively in big cities, where the network affiliated broadcast stations tend to be owned and operated by the networks with which they are affiliated.

The broadcasters don't really care if we use cable or Aereo, as long as they get paid whichever one it is, and they'd probably prefer it was Aereo, because that means you're not on cable so you're not watching cable only channels instead of them.

If you had the CBS franchise in your area, would you prefer to compete for eyeballs with only ABC, NBC, PBS, and FOX, or would you like HBO, TNT, TBS, USA, FX, AMC, TCM, A&E, SyFy, and a dozen or two more added in as well?

But they've gotten used to getting money from the cable companies whether the cable customers watch them or not.

It's the money that counts, if you and your neighbor share a OTA antenna and don't charge money that called reception, no problem, put up a community antenna and charge money for re-transmission, that what the Court has to decide.

Hahahaha what? This is maybe the most nonsensical thing I've ever heard.

Do you think the Mob is anti-capitalism? If you don't think capitalists will come to your door with guns, what about with chemicals they dumped into your water supply, like in Charleston WV? Or soot illegally vented to the air, like at KU energy in KY? Or what about with illegal anti-competitive hiring practices, like at Google/Apple/etc? Or maybe they will just mess up your life with rent seeking behaviors, like banning direct sales of Tesla motor's cars?

Your gibberish about capitalists being innocuous shows an incredibly naivety on many fronts. Capitalism is by definition a self-serving enterprise, and frequently results in zero-sum wealth distribution outcomes.

Actually your examples are what are nonsensical. Your first three examples are all illegal, and you labeled two of them as such. Government is supposed to protect us from illegal actions. You choose to view these examples as the primary results of capitalism, or free enterprise, which is just a smear job.

Banning direct sales of Tesla can only be done by government action so it's not an example of capitalism or free enterprise. Rather, if it succeeds, it's an example of government interfering with free enterprise to the detriment of consumers. With so much government control of everything, special interests (in this case the other car dealers) will lobby to rig the law in their favor. This only happens because lawmakers allow it, and they are only that kind of lawmaker because those who elect them are too apathetic to pay attention to what they do. It's terrible but do you know a better system?

Your examples of course represent instances of human nature. People in any situation try to pursue their self interests at the expense of others -- most of the time, although they sometimes fool themselves into thinking otherwise. Government provides many opportunities for this. If you think only capitalists have this impulse or indulge in it, **you** are the one being naive. Capitalists are subject to the law while government **is** the law. I'm a lot more afraid of the results of human nature among government members than of those of capitalists.

The USSR had a government that was defined as controlling everything to the benefit of the people. And on paper it did that right to the bitter end. What actually happened there was massive corruption and a failing economy. A popular saying then was "We pretend to work and they pretend to pay us".

__________________
"It must be swell to be so perfect and odor-free" -- Del Griffith

VideoReDo users: Try To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

pyTivo users: Try To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts. and To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

First of all, as an RF engineer, I can guarantee you that Aereo uses two or three giant antennas. The tiny objects are elements to the antenna. We're all receiving the same signal. Justices don't have an advanced degree in engineering, and you can find an engineer who'll say anything if you give him enough money to be an expert, but that's one giant antenna.

...............

.......

Really?

Here is a link to an article that has a video that shows their antenna farm and what the individual antennas look like. As well as discussing the process of one antenna for each individual and the equipment involved in the process.

Yes it does, IF the court is convinced that this is a unique and innovative use of technology and not just a gimmick to try and justify the copyright infringement.

This is an interesting question. It seems that the decision any given person makes in this regard is driven by the perspective they bring to the question. As the copyright owners, the broadcasters see a gimmick. As consumers, potential customers of Aereo see it is a clever innovation.

Personally, I am of two minds. As a person that makes her living selling intellectual property (enterprise computer software) any legal decision that erodes copyright protection makes me nervous. But as a television viewer and user of DVRs and many different video streaming technologies, I'd love to see Aereo succeed.

It will be interesting to see the decision and read the opinions of the Justices.

I'm not aware of any "legal" defintion of what constitutes retransmission. The broadcasters are arguing that the use of a "private" antenna is meaningless. Since Aereo is using an ATSC tuner to receive the broadcast, decoding the 8VSB signal and extracting the raw MPEG, then re-encoding that for transmission (I don't know which streaming protocol Aereo uses) on the Internet in IP packets, the broadcasters are arguing that this IS retransmission.

Why can't it be both a unique and innovative use of technology and a gimmick?

And if there is no legal definition of re-transmission, then how can the broadcasters claim they're owed money because the cable companies are doing it?

And unlike any other copyright question, this involves broadcasters getting to use the public airwaves, supposedly "in the public interest".

Here is a link to an article that has a video that shows their antenna farm and what the individual antennas look like. As well as discussing the process of one antenna for each individual and the equipment involved in the process.

Thanks -- very interesting. No details about the circuits that make the antennas work but there is a statement that they are actively tuned, presumably by switching in/out circuit elements (capacitance, inductance etc). I assume further details are proprietary.

Quote:

Originally Posted by unitron

Why can't it be both a unique and innovative use of technology and a gimmick?

And if there is no legal definition of re-transmission, then how can the broadcasters claim they're owed money because the cable companies are doing it?
.........

+1
Is SCOTUS going to be forced to define re-transmission to decide this case? I bet they cringe at that.

__________________
"It must be swell to be so perfect and odor-free" -- Del Griffith

VideoReDo users: Try To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

pyTivo users: Try To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts. and To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

They already do this in cities that the local affiliate is network owned and operated. That's why CBS was pulled from TWC/BHN, but not all cities, when there was the dispute between TWC and CBS.

The retrans agreement is between the station owners and the MVPDs, not between the network and the MVPDs.

So the network can't force the station owners to bundle with them in order to be part of the network? Although I guess at that point, the O&O stations would force bundle, and stations in smaller markets could do whatever they wanted...

Quote:

Originally Posted by unitron

No, it takes that RF signal and demodulates it, extracting the information and only recording the information onto the hard drive, discarding the carrier wave.

Ok, fair enough. But you get my point... A TiVo that's not tuning from an RF signal of some sort makes no sense.

It was curious to read the zat's not funny article comments about the judges owning a roku and such with not knowing if such is based on fact or not but it makes up a more interesting speculation. I would be more concerned about the judges truly understanding the true nature this emerging technology when the opposition is financed by corporate attorneys who are highly skilled in the art of BS.

I predict that Aero is going to lose this fight due as not as much the fact they are retransmitting the OTA signal without compensating the network providing it but more on the pretense the subscriber doesn't OWN the antenna/receiver/encoding system and rather are renting the service. My cable company is required to pay for the ability to send me the the OTA signal to me, the only thing I own is the some of the hardware once the cable enters my home, while it's not described this way but I by all means I rent the virtual assigned system the cable company uses to get the OTA RF signal from their antenna, receiver, encoder systems and so on until it gets to my house.

Their mistake perhaps and possible downfall will be they should have created a transfer of ownership were the subscriber owns the assigned virtual reciever system capable of receiving the OTA signals and not a rental agreement. Without the consumer legally owning the system, small as it might be this is nothing more than a retransmission system. Now this would have made a better argument, for example let's say the consumer buys the assigned collective virtual receiver system for $20 then the company would charge a "caretaking" $12.99 monthly fee to watch over, protect and repair the subscriber's property when the legal subscriber "owner" is unable to be there in person to do it themselves (or what ever you want to call Aereo's function to receive their monthly fee) . Should the "owner" decide they no longer wish to own the Internet OTA reciever, they sell it back to the caretaker (Aereo) were they advertise it to sell it to a new prospective owner and the process is repeated. That would seem to me a much better defence against the companies that are up in arms against Aereo.

Yes, OTA signals should be allowed to be delivered in the way Aereo does but in this world of corporate giants and special interest lobbyists, they are facing a lopsided battle that isn't in their favor. Now personally I can't imagine spending $12 a month just to receive OTA TV, but of course others feel I'm an idiot paying monthly fees to TiVo just so I can watch TV on my terms, granted they are simply offering a true cloud based dvr service but they are also acting in the same manner as a cable company and most likely will be required to have payed contracts to retransmit the network OTA signals.

I just heard the oral arguments on C-SPAN. I thought the Aereo attorney did an excellent job and if the case were to be decided purely on reason and fairness, Aereo would win. But it will be decided on interpretation of stupid laws passed by Congress so I'm afraid Aereo is screwed.

What Aereo does is identical in effect to having additional people buy antennas and DVR's and view/record OTA signals, which is perfectly legal. Why having additional OTA viewers should be subject to royalties is a mystery to me. I would think the broadcasters would welcome that.

__________________
"It must be swell to be so perfect and odor-free" -- Del Griffith

VideoReDo users: Try To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

pyTivo users: Try To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts. and To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

What Aereo does is identical in effect to having additional people buy antennas and DVR's and view/record OTA signals, which is perfectly legal. Why having additional OTA viewers should be subject to royalties is a mystery to me. I would think the broadcasters would welcome that.

How? how on earth is them running a service of a farm of antennas and providing a DVR and bandwidth for your app without you ever actually receiving the signal in your home "the same"? that's the part of the logic from your side of the fence that I just don't understand, you the consumer never have the actual signal in your "possession" Aereo has total control of the signal, and that's why my opinion is that they don't have a chance in winning.

__________________"There is a distinct difference between having an open mind and having a hole in your head from which your brain leaks out."

More than one poster has pointed out that the Aereo approach is not "scalable". I'm not so sure of that. Lets say the cost of setting up a tiny antenna and tuning circuit is $500 and make the worst case assumption that there actually has to be one antenna per subscirber. Say the cost of maintaining the equipment and the cloud support costs $4/mo. per sub. That leaves $4/mo to amortize the antenna/tuner cost, or $48/year. That is almost a 10% return on the $500 investment, which is quite attractive.

My numbers are pulled out of the air but even if they are way off, the potential for profitable scalability seems to be there.

I agree that Aereo is likely scalable. The reason it will fail as a business is because if this is found to be legal, cable companies will offer a competing service and crush them.

__________________
A passing grade? Like a C? Why don't I just get pregnant at a bus station!

........
What Aereo does is identical in effect to having additional people buy antennas and DVR's and view/record OTA signals...........

Quote:

Originally Posted by dianebrat

How? how on earth is them running a service of a farm of antennas and providing a DVR and bandwidth for your app without you ever actually receiving the signal in your home "the same"? that's the part of the logic from your side of the fence that I just don't understand, you the consumer never have the actual signal in your "possession" Aereo has total control of the signal, and that's why my opinion is that they don't have a chance in winning.

The key words you are ignoring in my statement are "in effect". The functionality, including control of the signal (i.e., what is tuned, what is viewed and what is recorded), is identical to having an antenna and DVR in your home.

There is no way the broadcaster could even detect a difference. The problem is the stupid existing law set the precedent for retransmission fees by Cable and SATV, which was wrong to begin with. But the SCOTUS has to be consistent with existing law if at all possible. That is what may doom Aereo.

The fees Aereo charges are just for setting up and maintaining your antenna and cloud DVR, **not** for the video content. The video content is already available for free so why would a consumer pay for it? No, they pay for the convenience of not having to have their own antenna and DVR. Some customers also benefit because they cannot locate an antenna where it would get good reception, e.g., amongst tall city buildings.

__________________
"It must be swell to be so perfect and odor-free" -- Del Griffith

VideoReDo users: Try To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

pyTivo users: Try To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts. and To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

I agree that Aereo is likely scalable. The reason it will fail as a business is because if this is found to be legal, cable companies will offer a competing service and crush them.

You have more confidence in the business acumen of cable companies than I do. I wonder if they actually could compete for $8/mo. There's an interview with the founder of Aereo in the C-SPAN archives and he responds to this issue. IIRC his attitude was something like "let the cookie crumble". He strikes me as someone who could run circles around the fossilized MSO's. If not with Aereo then with some other innovative venture.

__________________
"It must be swell to be so perfect and odor-free" -- Del Griffith

VideoReDo users: Try To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

pyTivo users: Try To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts. and To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

Cable companies wouldn't use this technology to compete for $12/mo, they would use it to save the millions they pay in retransmission fees.

This while business is f*cked up. They give the content away for free, transmit clear over the air, but they expect that people pay extra for any method of receiving it other then their opinion of approved technology.

If their content is so f*cking valuable then they should move to cable and start charging for it. But instead they want to have their cake and eat it too. They want to use OUR airwaves for free, to make millions (billions?) on advertising, but if anyone tries to make a dollar making it easier for people to access that content they want a chunk of that as well. It's corporate greed at it's finest.